


Soul Stone

by nothingbutnow



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cartwheels, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Infinity Gauntlet, Infinity Stones, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Sad with a Happy Ending, Soul Stone (Marvel)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-23
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2020-01-24 13:53:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18572833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothingbutnow/pseuds/nothingbutnow
Summary: They may be helpless, but they are not hopeless. Peter won't let them.In honour of Avengers: Endgame.





	1. Settling In

**Author's Note:**

> an updated version of something i posted a month ago, now extended and in 3 parts!! enjoy!

_Mister Stark...I don't feel so good._

_I don't know-I don't know what's happening..._

_I don't wanna go, I don't wanna go_

_Sir please, I don't wanna go..._

...please!" Peter screams at the top of his lungs, eyes bursting open as a bright yellow light seems to engulf him, only not all of him, but just his soul. He feels as though every fiber of his being is ripping apart, physically and mentally, as bits of his skin come off looking like ash. He's being cremated, except that he's not dead. He was perfectly fine and healthy a moment ago.

He'll never forget how his calloused hands felt clawing against the smooth, crimson metal on Tony's back as if Peter was being pulled away. It's what it felt like, at least. It felt like his soul was the marionette, and the strings attached to his shoulders were yanking him into an oblivion that he'll probably never escape. It was a whole pile of pain plus more, whatever his remaining nerve cells could pick up and send to his brain, which seemed like a lot. 

It's not Tony's fault, none of this was, and Peter wants to tell him that so badly. Nothing Tony could have done would have changed anything. It was fate. Even Doctor Strange had said that it was almost inevitable that they would lose. And of course none of them wanted to believe that, but even superheroes can't win all of the time. It's just not possible.

Peter wants to tell Tony so many things, but nothing can seem to come out of his mouth except for pathetic bursts of cowardly slurs, and he regrets it as soon as he says it. This is not how Peter wanted to be remembered. He wanted to be Spider-Man, _the_ Spider-Man, the one everyone would admire for sacrificing himself for the greater good. Not a scared little kid clinging onto Iron Man like that would do anything to help him. He wanted to be the hero.

Really, he just wanted to help.

The ashes, his skin and flesh, float away from him so delicately, dancing in the windless air with such grace that it almost becomes entrancing and he feels almost a sense of calmness until he's not on Titan anymore. Until Mister Stark's arms are not wrapped tightly around him as though this would protect him from the inevitability of his cremation. Until he isn't leaning over Peter with a speechless expression as his mouth just hangs open helplessly, because it's not like he can do anything about it.

Everything happens both in a split second and a million years, and soon the searing pain he once felt spreading over his skin becomes only a memory when it's reduced down to a numb feeling. And as soon as it comes, the numbing is also gone and he opens his eyes to find that he is lying face-up on a hard, dry dirt ground. It is completely silent, not even the sound of a slight wind whistling past his ears, in fact there seems to be no air at all. Above him, the sky is a distant yellow hue, not the brilliant blue he's grown accustomed to. No Sun or clouds either.

"Welcome," says a voice, deep and regal, a king beginning a proclamation. To Peter, the first thing that comes to mind is heaven. It's the kind of voice one would imagine God sounding like. Both comforting and yet also stern. Fatherly but assertive.

It speaks again, coming from above from where Peter's head lays. "You okay? You look a little flustered."

With nothing but a substantial amount of confusion and a bucket full of anxiety running through his veins, Peter brings himself into a slightly unstable standing position, wiping dry tears from his cheeks. Tears that probably also dropped onto Tony's suit. 

“Yeah...yeah," he sniffles for a moment before turning around to where the voice had come from.

"Took you long enough," Doctor Strange rolls his eyes dismissively, although he is looking down toward his feet. He's still wearing the same robes he had on before he disappeared, which means...

The Spider-Suit Tony designed is still clad to Peter's body, although now it has a lighter feeling to it. Almost as if it's not actually there.

His first instinct is to test the web shooters, and he aims his hand up towards the golden dome, middle and ring finger hovering over the button, but Stephen stops him. "I wouldn't bother trying since the suit isn't even real."

Peter's arm slowly lowers and his eyebrows furrow over his nose in response to Strange's out-of-nowhere statement, which only brings about more questions. Peter's mind is awake and racing with thoughts that seem to battle for immediate attention: Where is he? Where is Mister Stark? Why isn't Mister Stark with him? Where is Thanos?

The only string of words Peter can think to spit out however, are, "Why isn't it...what happened?"

Strange sighs, as though he has given up on everything. "I think anyone here can figure that out, but if you need me to spell it out for you: Thanos won. We're dead."

Peter stumbles back in surprise. Dead? He can't be. Not yet. He'd just been inducted into the Avengers. He didn't even get to say a proper goodbye to Ned. What will Ned do if he's all alone? What if he's dead too?

His mind continues to fill with more burning questions, the next most important one being, "What about Mister Stark? Where's he? Will I ever see him again?" It pours out of his mouth before he can even comprehend it. Did he prioritise Tony Stark over his actual family? Usually when kids are alone, they'd ask for their mum or something, but for Peter, the first person he thinks of is Mister Stark. It feels strangely comforting though.

"To be determined," Strange's eyes are focused on a point far away, and stares into space looking distant, obviously deeply pondering something. "We'll just have to wait and see if they can do it."

Who's they? What are they doing? Peter would ask, but instead he just nods, only half-listening now, as his brain demands his attention. He pushes a piece of his disheveled hair out of his eyes as they follow Strange's gaze behind him, where a dark lump interrupts the otherwise flat horizon.

It's a person-sized lump, like someone hunched over their knees sitting just a little ways away from Peter, 10 New York City blocks at least. He takes a series of cautious steps closer, not waiting for Strange to give him stupid permission or anything else (if he's dead, what does he have to live for?). He then makes a heat-of-the-moment decision and breaks into a run, but he trips over his own feet and almost falls, he's still so overcome with grief. Grief for himself and for Strange and others who have also had to go through this, grief for those still alive, who lost so many. Grief for Tony, who could still be alive or maybe not, Peter may never know.

Before he knows what's happening, Peter's on the ground again, except this time he's hugging his knees over his face to hide the waterfall of tears that come rushing down his cheeks. He can't even begin to imagine how regular civilians must feel about this, not knowing anything and then begin whisked off to another dimension without any sort of explanation or comfort. In this moment, Peter has never felt so alone, so helpless.

"Hey, are you okay?" a person taps Peter's heaving shoulders as he chokes back broken, hopeless sobs, but this person's voice is different. Its a little airier, less diplomatic and more sympathetic. Much more welcoming than Stephen's.

"Sorry, I just..." Peter can hear his weak voice squeak, and he wipes his eyes to look up at a man in a dark armor, long, dark hair resting just below their strong, square shoulders. And...is that a metal arm? "Wait, I know you."

The solemn expression painted over his face softens at the sight of a harmless-looking teen in front of him. "You do?"

"Wait...weren't you at that airport for that battle in Europe or something?" Peter's says as he stands up to get a closer look at the other man's face and figure, trying not to stare at the place where the metal arm meets the flesh of his shoulder. "I was there with Mister Stark, although you may know me as..."

"Jesus Christ, you're Spider-Man," the guy says, trying his best not to roll his eyes at the kid, as it looks like he just went through a lot. "That little shit..."

"I'll have you know you were no better," Peter crosses his arms, remembering how he had this guy wrapped up in webs and practically begging for mercy. "You're Snow-Something, right? Snow Soldier maybe? Oh wait, you're Winter Soldier-"

The man uses his good arm to scratch the back of his head awkwardly, and Peter can't help but stare at the way his biceps contract. Bucky looks up at the golden sky that floats above them, not even like a sky at all actually, more like a smooth silk moving in the wind, or water rippling after you drop a rock into it. Ever-changing, never the same. "I...prefer to go by White Wolf."

"Oh, a rebrand," Peter crosses his arms, trying his best to flex his biceps as well, although there's not much muscle to flex. "I get it man, sometimes you just have to let go of the old and..."

"You know what? Just call me Bucky."

Peter just gulps, nodding. "Sure, yep. Bucky it is."

There's a silence that creeps into the conversation, the kind when you're too scared or distraught to think of anything to say to keep it going, until Peter clears his throat again. "You...um...did you disintegrate too?"

"What do you mean?" Bucky turns away to check their surroundings, almost paranoid-like, but Peter also can't help but notice a tear forming in his eye.

"I mean did your skin come off in little pieces and float around in the air before you..." Peter's voice cracks again, and he sniffles, "...appeared here?"

"And did it feel like my soul was being wrenched out of me and floating into an oblivion? Yeah, pretty much," Bucky blinks his eyes a few times in an effort to contain his emotions.

Peter sighs, from relief or just to calm himself, he's not sure. "Cool, because it would have been awkward if I was the only one, especially since I cried like a baby in front of Mister Stark and..."

"You were with Tony?"

"Yeah, on Titan. With um...a wizard who's here too, and a weird 80's dude, and a couple of aliens," Peter shuffles his feet against the firm, coffee-coloured ground. "I...I didn't want to go. We had just lost a fight with Thanos and..."

"Wait Thanos was on Titan?" Bucky uncrosses his arms to seem a little more welcoming, as his big, buff appearance does make him appear a little standoffish. "That's who we were fighting in Wakanda when..."

"Peter?" says a voice from behind them, meek and mouse-like, and Peter turns around to find Mantis walking towards them, big dark eyes filled with confused, distraught tears. "Peter, what happened? Why did I-"

"I don't know but Doctor Strange says we're dead," Peter sighs shakily, he still can't seem to fully grasp the concept. This isn't what he imagined being dead would feel like. He imagined a light, sort of anti-gravity feeling, like he was floating. This was nothing light; he felt heavy, like there was still something left inside of him that told him he didn't belong here. He belonged on earth with Mister Stark and Ned and Aunt May and the Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man. He couldn't spend the rest of time like this.

Mantis is also taken aback by the statement. "Dead? No, that cannot be. This is not Helheim."

"You're right, this isn't Helheim, or heaven, or wherever you believe you go after death," Stephen Strange appears beside Peter, and puts a comforting hand on his shoulder. "Because this is the soul stone."


	2. Waiting

"Hey Doc."

_”Doctor Strange."_

"Hey Doctor Strange, how long have we been here for?"

"How many times do I have to tell you: time does not exist in the soul stone. We are dead, it doesn't affect us. It _can't_ affect us."

"Right, right, that makes sense," Peter lays down and stares up at the pale lemon sky, something he's spent a lot of time staring at—but not time if time doesn't exist. He's just looked at it a lot. He's looked at it so much, that he can't even remember what the sky on Earth looks like anymore. But he misses the blue sky and it's sun and clouds a lot.

But this sky is pretty cool too. If you look at it for long enough, he's come to notice, it can shine in a way that makes it seem like the cuts of a jewel, as if they are stuck inside of the actual soul stone. Which they are, of course. As Stephen as told him more times than he can count.

He just can't seem to process it. That half the population of the universe, more than a trillion individuals at least, can fit inside of one small stone. Peter's seen it with his own eyes, it was pretty small. But then again, the horizon seems to go on for hundreds of miles around them. It never ends

They tried to walk, tried to find someone else around here that could comfort them and they could comfort. They walked for what seemed like an eternity before Stephen was the first to sit and give in. Peter didn't want to stop, he wanted to find Ned or Aunt May, Happy, maybe even Tony. He missed all of them more than he can say. But he couldn't bear to leave stubborn Stephen Strange alone forever either. 

Him and Mantis ended up sitting next to Strange like two lost puppies, but Bucky couldn't take just sitting around and doing nothing for much longer.

"I have to go," Bucky sighs, obviously having been thinking about it for a while now.

"You can't leave," Peter begs almost immediately, although he knew it was coming. 

It makes everything even less dramatic and much more awkward when Bucky has nothing to pack up or bring with him, and ends up just standing there like an idiot with nothing to do but listen to Peter's pleads. "I can't just sit here idly and wait for the world to end, I've gotta see who else is here, if there's any of my...friends or something," Bucky 

"What about me and Mantis?" Peter frowns, not wanting to seem like an immature brat, but the question still slips out. He looks to Stephen for support, but the doctor id's sitting cross-legged, eyes screwed shut. He couldn't care less.

"You'll be fine, you've got company," Bucky says. "T'Challa, Steve, Sam, if anyone else is out there alone, I can't bear to think about how they're dealing with this. I have to help them."

Mantis' lip curls upward, and she beams proudly. "Spoken like a true hero."

Bucky seems bashful at the statement, and sends a small smile back. "If fate brings me back, then I'll be back. If life gives us a second chance, then I'll see you out there."

Peter was upset watching Bucky walk away, each step making him seem smaller and smaller until he was a small pixel on the desktop of a computer, just barely noticeable. He wanted to do the same thing, Peter wants to be the hero, but at the same time he can't leave Strange—he seems too emotionally vulnerable right now, with everything that's happened. So he'll stay and be the hero here. But in a different way, in the Friendly Neignbourhood Spider-Man sort of way. In the way huge knew how to help. He'll be the lost bike kind of hero.

"Do you think they are going to defeat Thanos?" Mantis asks in a whisper, sitting beside Peter's head long after Bucky has left, but how long they will never know. Her big brown eyes even wider with the worry of not knowing the fate of her friends or of the outside world. "Whoever is alive, I mean."

"If we ever get out, you'll find your answer," Strange, who is still sitting cross-legged on the other side of Peter and is clearly trying to meditate, grunts bitchily.

Even if there is no conception of time in the soul stone, they sure have been there for what seems like an eternity. Peter has run out of things for him and Mantis to do: he's taught Mantis how to play rock paper scissors and chopsticks, both games they have played so many times together that Strange had to ban them from ever doing it again because he got so annoyed with them. They drew things on the dirt ground, exchanged stories about their adventures (Mantis has the best ones, although she enjoyed hearing Peter's stories about the tech savvy 21st century earth). Peter taught her how to cartwheel, but refrained from any other gymnastics moves because Stephen yelled at them again. They even made up a secret handshake for the two of them.

Even though they've been down here for what feels like longer than forever, Peter has never once felt hungry, thirsty, or even so much as tired. Mantis had even tried to use her sleep-inducing trance on Peter, but to no avail, neither Strange's nor her magic seemed to work. Strange was not surprised when they told him this. They are dead after all.

It made sense, but it still left Peter on-edge, especially the food part. Would he ever experience quality New York pizza again? Or be able to go out with Aunt May to the Asian place around the corner from their apartment and laugh when the waiter tried to flirt with her? Or get ice cream with Ned on their way home from school?

Sometimes Peter didn't believe Doctor Strange. Sometimes it did feel like there was a sense of time. Maybe he didn't age, or grow hungry or anything, but it wasn't like they were frozen in one spot either. Peter knew something must be happening outside of the soul stone, even if they may never know what it is.

He just hopes it's not something bad.

>><<

"Peter!" A short round silhouette comes running clumsily towards where Peter, Mantis, and Strange are sitting together.

"Ned?" Peter looks up, a little hope flickers in his eyes. It's the scratchy voice of a pubescent teenager, a little rough around the edges, but it's one he thought he'd never hear again and he wouldn't have it any other way. 

"Peter! Oh my God!!" There's a chuckle intertwined with the words, Ned's chuckle, and silhouette bounces closer still. As soon as Peter sees the mop of dark hair, joy washes over him in overwhelming amounts, and he's up and sprinting across the ground towards his best friend in a millisecond.

They meet in the middle and try for some weird hug, they'd never been the kind of friends for physical signs of affection. However, since they are souls and made of practically nothing, they end up passing through each other like the way ghosts do in movies and completing nothing. Even so, having Ned is all Peter could ask for in that moment. Just someone to pull him back to the ground, someone he's known and who knows him and who can be there and who he can be there for. Sure, Mantis is sweet enough, and Stephen is...Stephen, but they're not the same as Ned is. Ned _knows_ Peter. He knows practically everything about the teen: what his favourite food is, what movie makes cry, and what can make him feel better.

It's only when they pass through each other, arms disappointed in the loss of a touch of flesh, that Ned breaks down into sobs.

"I should have never let you leave the bus," he blurts between stifling loud sobs. "I should have told you to stay, I should have..." 

"What the hell are you talking about?" Peter's eyebrows droop. "If anything, I should be thanking you for helping me, all of this would have happened a lot sooner had I not been there with Mr. Stark."

"...wait really?" Ned's wipes his eyes, sniffling.

Peter nods, his shoulders straightening with pride. "He told me so."

"What?! That's so cool, dude, I can't believe you...who's that?" Ned looks over Peter's shoulder where Mantis and Stephen are sitting a few meters away, both trying not to eavesdrop and seem rude.

"That's Mantis, she's an alien I met on Titan, and..."

"Woah, woah woah, you went to _space_?!"

>><<

"...and that's all you need to know about what happened," Peter brushes his hands together as he finishes up the story of his adventures since he leapt out the window of the bus.

Ned breaks into applause instantly. "Beautiful, I laughed, I cried..."

"You are a master storyteller, Peter Parker," Mantis says in her delicate, feathery tone. 

"I guess all those years of fanfiction writing payed off," Peter giggles, his cheeks painted a rosy pink. 

Ned lays back, arms folded above his head. "I can't believe there's a purple Shrek with a Ruffles-shaped chin that's been roaming the universe looking for stones to rule everything and no one bothered to tell me about it."

"The more people knew about it, the more involved everyone would have wanted to be, which would have been no better than what actually happened," Stephen said, the first words to come out of his mouth since he last yelled at Mantis and Peter for trying to play solitaire in the dirt. 

"I guess that's true," Ned sighs, about to close his eyes when...

"Hello? Are you guys Avengers?"

Stephen Strange opens an eye at the sound of the new voice, this one high airy and also heavy with determination. "Who the hell are you?"

The woman standing in front of him crosses her arms over her chest. "Hope, who the hell are _you_?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> part 3 comes out next week


	3. Back Again

"Woah woah woah, you can shrink and grow?!" Ned's mouth falls open in shock and admiration for this woman sitting in front of him. This woman who has lived on the same planet as him with virtually the same amount of abilities as him, and yet has found a way to do something that scientists haven't even come close to experimenting on yet.

"Wait, that's so cool!" Peter geeks out as well. "Why didn't Mister Stark do that for me?"

"Because Tony Stark isn't my dad," Hope Pym, who had shown up just a little while ago after she'd been wandering around for quite some time (according to her, she's looking for her dad) and decided to sit with them for a little bit before continuing on her journey. "Only he knows how to use the Pym Particles."

Peter tries to shake the shocked look from his face, but it's unable to hide how in awe he is. "Hold on, so you can shrink or expand anything?" 

"Virtually, yeah," Hope laughs at their enthusiasm. "You guys have a lot of—"

"So you could make my cat grow to like 8 feet tall?" 

"What about shrinking someone smaller than the air particles? Have you tried that?"

"Wait, what if we could just hook up everyone we don't like with these Pin-things and just shrink them until they're..."

"How tall have you been able to expanded to?" Mantis, sat a little ways away from the three of them but as invested in Hope's story as the two freshman are, asks with a childish sparkle in her eye.

Hope, sighs, a teacher hounded with too many aggressions at once. "Well, we haven't fully tested the limits of it, but my...friend Scott grew at least a couple hundred feet."

"What the shit, a couple hundred?" Ned leaves back in surprise. "So what, he was literally the giant from Jack and the Beanstalk or..."

"Hey, do you think that if we ever get out of here, your dad could get some of that Pym stuff for me?" Peter says, ding his best to look like he's important enough. "I mean, I am Spider-Man after all. If we're gonna be bug-hero buddies..."

Hope's smile remains as big as it was when she first fund them. "I'll see what I can-"

"I wouldn't go around making promises I can't keep if I were you," Stephen says, sat in the same cross-legged pose that he was before Hope appeared, even since Bucky left, his eyes squeezed shut.

"Aw come on, Doc. It's fun to dream a little bit," Peter shrugs, cracking a slight smile to try and lift Strange's mood, which has been down past the dumps ever since they showed up here what geeks like both a million years and a second ago. "Maybe you should try it sometime—"

"Dreaming will get you nowhere," Strange opens his eyes to send Peter a dirty look one your parents might give you when your misbehaving in public fur the thirtieth time and they can't deal wuth it anymore. "If you want something, go out and get it for yourself."

Mantis looks at Stephen with her big, once joyous but now saddened, eyes. "But we are unable to do that, Doctor Strange. We cannot go and get it, ski we must dream instead. We may be helpless, but we are not hopeless."

"Yeah, Mantis gets it," Peter and her exchange a friendly, encouraging glance. "What harm does it do to dream a little?"

"It's fine until you realise that out of the 4 million ways that you've envisioned this conflict resolving, only one of those ways will bring us back," Stephen slowly stands up and begins pacing aggressively, his jaw set and his eyes wild with a rage that needs to be set free. "One out of over four million. Do you have any idea how low that brings our chances? Less than one percent. Hell, less than 5 hundredths of a percent. We're so deep in the decimal places, I bet you even the scientists have not discovered that deep yet, even the ones who are still alive. We are not leaving, and we probably never will leave, don't you get that, Peter? We're dead and there's nothing any of us can do about it. No therapy, no mystic arts training that can magically heal our souls, nothing can or will bring you back to your precious Tony Stark, or your Drax, or your dad with his shrinking serums or your New York City pizza. And I'm sorry to be so blunt with you all, but that's the truth. And there's no use hiding it from you since its not going to change anytime soon."

Stephen exhales sharply out of his nose like an angered bull, and walks away to recompose himself after he sees Peter who sat under him, close to tears. Ned, who is sat next to Peter, holds back a loud sob while Mantis just sits wuth her head low, eyes closed.

A hot minute later, Strange returns with start breathes and a soft expression. "I'm sorry. I should not have said that. It was rash and uncalled for, and I was being naive and..."

"No it's...it's fine I...we needed to hear that I think," Peter, slightly embarrassed with himself, wipes his tear filled eyes. His lip is trembling and although his voice is raspy and broken, he continues: "You're right, I shouldn't get my hopes up, we've been here for probably eons now, for all we know the earth could've exploded and..."

"Guys?" Hope, who was sitting next to Peter but is now up on her feet, looks towards the golden horizon with twinkling eyes half filled with hope and half in fear. "Is it just me or is the sky splitting apart?"

Peter, Mantis, and Ned all follow her gaze, and sure enough, the middle of the sky seems to be opening like a an old, stiff book. Peter doesn't take anymore time feeling pity and beings cheering with Ned. Mantis claps her hand a together, still close to tears but for a better reason this time. 

Even Stephen looks close to ecstatic. "They did it. They actually did it."

"Holy shit," Ned's mouth falls open in utter shock, but not at the sky. Instead, his wide eyes are angled down towards his feet, which have disappeared.

Peter's face scrunches together in worry when he sees half of his friend's body completely vanished. "Ned? What the fu—"

But before he can say anything else, Peter suddenly gasps and points to Strange's arm, which is slowly disappearing followed by his legs and torso.

"Doc, are you okay? What's-"

"See you on the other side, bud," Stephen laughs wholeheartedly, the first time he's laughed since before this all happened, and Peter can spot a huge grin plastered on his face before all of him has gone back into reality. It's so trance-like, watching Strange disappear, that he misses the last of his best friend before he follows suit.

Mantis, however, jumps up and down wildly, her eyes big not with sadness as Peter had grown used to them being, but with 100 percent joy and excitement. And she watches with curiosity and pleasure as she too fades away, followed by Hope.

"I'll talk to my dad," Hope tells Peter before her head shimmers and vanishes upon into the hole in the sky. "I promise."

And just a split second later, Peter himself can feel his own legs disappearing, only it doesn't feel like he's losing them, but more like he's gaining them. The muscle and bone is returning, filling his feet and his thighs, then his waist and stomach and then his fingers and arms and finally his head. The metal Oof his suit puts a weight back on his shoulders. It's giving himself a new feeling that he thought he'd never have again. His heart is beating, his blood is pumping. He feels alive.

>><<

Getting dirt in your eye is not the best way to come back from being dead, but of course that's what Peter wakes to. It's a very prominent inconvenience, an itch in the side of his right eye that makes him want to pull the entire eye out to be free from the pain, but he couldn't be happier. It's a physical feeling, his nervous system is working. It might not be working for him, but he's feeling something nonetheless, and it's the best feeling ever.

He doesn't waste anymore time with his face in the ground (literally) and gains enough recognition in his legs that he can roll over into his back (Does he even have core strength anymore, since he couldn't exercise in the Soul Stone? Is that a thing to worry about?) Thoughts pour into his brain in alarming amounts, an annoying welcome back into the fast-paced real world. 

He didn't realise until then how slow everything felt when he was dead. Being inside of the Soul Stone was like being stuck in slow motion for all of eternity. And yet, now that he thinks about it, he can't seem to remember anything of importance that happened whilst he was there. He can't even remember what it looked like.

"The life-sized insect boy has awakened," says a voice, rough and extremely deep, from above where Peter lays, and he feels a drop of spit fall on his forehead. 

"Gross, Jesus Christ," Peter hears himself mutter, but he can't seem to raise his arm enough to wipe it off. He is however, able to open his eyes which he does (only the left because the right still stings like hell) to find a grey-blue bald alien with muscles that Thor would be jealous of, hovering over his face. Something inside Peter's discombobulated mind tells him this is Drax.

Silently wishing for the sky above him to be the brilliant blue he missed so much, Peter is disappointed to find that it's the red-brown earthy sky he'd grown to associate with the dump-planet Titan. Right back where everything ended. In the same place he left Tony. 

Where's Tony?

Before he can take a breath to ask though, Drax's laughs wholeheartedly and claps his hands together at the sight of Peter's one open eye. "He's alive!!!" 

"Why wouldn't he be?" says another voice outside of Peter's peripheral vision, this one a bit higher than Drax's, but still masculine and a little raspy.

"We were afraid he wouldn't make it," says yet another voice, this one Peter can instantly match to Mantis, although he doesn't know how or why.

"Make it? The hell do you mean, 'make it'? There was no risk whatsoever."

"What's going on?" Peter blurts out against his will, slowly gaining feeling in his arms. It's in the pins and needles stage now.

"We're alive, Quill's namesake! We dud not die!" Drax booms out to the ends of the horizon.

"How? Why?"

"Well, in case you don't have the mental capacity to figure it out, someone defeated Thanos, duh!!"

"What? We did?" Peter asks with a hint of excitement, having no recollection of ever winning in a battle against the purple giant whatsoever.

"Not us, but the people who didn't die must have," says another voice to Peter's right, and he looks to see Doctor Strange sifting through piles of debris, in a hasty search for something. "Which must include Tony and your blue robot-friend, since neither of them are anywhere around here."

Peter's eyes bug out. "You mean Mister Stark survived?"

"Survived and escaped back to Earth," replies Strange with a hint of admiration also slight jealousy in his voice. "There's no trace of him."

"Well then we have to get back to Earth," Peter says adamantly, pushing his arms against the dirt to sit up. "We have to make sure everyone's okay, I gotta get home..."

The man next to him, which he can now identify as Peter Quill, sighs. "That's what we're in the middle of doing right now. This wizard-doctor dude... 

"Master of the mystic arts..." Strange interjects annoyingly.

"...says he's got a frisbee-bracelet..."

Strange huffs: "...sling ring..." 

"...that can make a portal back to Earth if he finds it." Quill huffs back with an equal amount of aggression, just as annoyed with Strange's as Strange is annoyed with him.

"The problem is I can't find it," Stephen pinches the bridge of his nose in an unsuccessful effort to calm himself down.

Mantis scrunches her eyebrows together. "You mean this thing?" She holds up a piece of metal, shaped with two rings to fit your fingers into and a piece on top to hold it together. Strange's cape reaches out to grab it from her, and after a moment of heavy inspection, slips it through his fingers.

"Where'd you find this?" Stephen asks.

Draw was quick to answer for her. “On the floor.”

“It looked cool," Mantis shrugged nonchalantly, and Peter took the time Stephen used to create the portal to get up and stretch his legs.

Him, as well as Quill, Drax, and Mantis, watched in awe as Stephen's shaky fingers swirled and out came a portal in front of him, rimmed in orange sparks. On the other side, Peter saw a wide grassland that stretched out for miles, and the sun high in the sky, as bright as he remembered. He can't help but grin in excitement.

"Where are we going?" Mantis asks with a slightly worried expression.

Stephen is quick to answer. "Wakanda." 

"You knew this was gonna happen," Peter says in realization, eyes still locked on the other side of the portal. Strange saw over four million outcomes to all of this, going to Wakanda had to be part of one of them.

"A magician never reveals his secrets," is all Doctor Strange says before he's not on Titan anymore. "Now come on, we gotta finish saving the universe."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> all done!!! yayyyy
> 
> if y’all want me to do something like this again, feel free to message me on tumblr or wattpad

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on Tumblr @emu118


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